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didn't tell me that... I thought she got it for keeps - that she could leave it to any one she liked?”
    “No. By the statute relating to intestacy of 1925...”
    It is doubtful whether Frances listened to his explanation. She said when his voice stopped:
    “It hardly matters to us personally. We'll be dead and buried, long before she's middle-aged. How old is she? Twenty-five - twenty-six? She'll probably live to be seventy.”
    Jeremy Cloade said doubtfully:
    “We might ask her for a loan - putting it on family grounds? She may be a generous-minded girl - really we know so little of her -”
    Frances said: “At any rate we have been reasonably nice to her - not catty like Adela. She might respond.”
    Her husband said warningly:
    “There must be no hint of - er - real urgency.”
    Frances said impatiently: “Of course not! The trouble is that it's not the girl herself we shall have to deal with. She's completely under the thumb of that brother of hers.”
    “A very unattractive young man,” said Jeremy Cloade.
    Frances sudden smile flashed out.
    “Oh, no,” she said. “He's attractive. Most attractive. Rather unscrupulous, too, I should imagine. But then as far as that goes, I'm unscrupulous too!”
    Her smile hardened. She looked up at her husband.
    “We're not going to be beaten, Jeremy,” she said. “There's bound to be some way... if I have to rob a bank!”

Taken at the Flood

Chapter 3
    “Money!” said Lynn.
    Rowley Cloade nodded. He was a big square young man with a brick-red skin, thoughtful blue eyes and very fair hair. He had a slowness that seemed more purposeful than ingrained. He used deliberation as others use quickness of repartee.
    “Yes,” he said, “everything seems to boil down to money these days.”
    “But I thought farmers had done so well during the war?”
    “Oh, yes - but that doesn't do you any permanent good. In a year we'll be back where we were - with wages up, workers unwilling, everybody dissatisfied and nobody knowing where they are. Unless, of course, you can farm in a really big way. Old Gordon knew. That was where he was preparing to come in.”
    “And now -” Lynn asked.
    Rowley grinned.
    “And now Mrs Gordon goes to London and spends a couple of thousand on a nice mink coat.”
    “It's - it's wicked!”
    “Oh, no -” He paused and said: “I'd rather like to give you a mink coat, Lynn -”
    “What's she like, Rowley?” She wanted to get a contemporary judgment.
    “You'll see her tonight. At Uncle Lionel's and Aunt Kathie's party.”
    “Yes, I know. But I want you to tell me. Mums says she's half-witted?”
    Rowley considered.
    “Well - I shouldn't say intellect was her strong point. But I think really she only seems half-witted because she's being so frightfully careful.”
    “Careful? Careful about what?”
    “Oh, just careful. Mainly, I imagine, about her accent - she's got quite a brogue, you know, or else about the right fork, and any literary allusions that might be flying around.”
    “Then she really is - quite - well, uneducated?”
    Rowley grinned.
    “Oh, she's not a lady, if that's what you mean. She's got lovely eyes, and a very good complexion - and I suppose old Gordon fell for that, with her extraordinary air of being quite unsophisticated. I don't think it's put on - though of course you never know. She just stands around looking dumb and letting David run her.”
    “David?”
    “That's the brother. I should say there's nothing much about sharp practice he doesn't know!” Rowley added: “He doesn't like any of us much.”
    “Why should he?” said Lynn sharply, and added as he looked at her, slightly surprised, “I mean you don't like him.”
    “I certainly don't. You won't either. He's not our sort.”
    “You don't know who I like, Rowley, or who I don't! I've seen a lot of the world in the last three years. I - I think my outlook has broadened.”
    “You've seen more of the world than I have, that's true.”
    He said it